(1) Making Dough for Making Bread
In a method for performing uniform mixing when making dough for making bread using a conventional mixer for making bread such as a vertical-type mixer, a spiral mixer, or the like, in order to obtain water mixing in which powder material such as wheat flour and liquid material are uniformly mixed, non-uniformity in water mixing which occurs at the beginning of mixing of the two materials (i.e., portions which contain excessive water and portions in which the wheat flour and water are not yet mixed, both of which appear when adding water into the wheat flour) are made uniform by mixing them.
However, since a large amount of air existing within a powder materials in a fine particle condition such as wheat flour has a tendency to stick strongly onto powder material particles, it blocks liquid material moving through the powder material, thereby blocking spreading for uniformity of the liquid material. Therefore, it takes time to perform uniform mixing, and as a result, gluten is produced in the meanwhile. Thus, various kinds of gluten formations which will lower the product quality and are therefore not desired by bakers will be produced within the dough, when effecting the water mixing.
Accordingly, bakers seeking high quality have to take troublesome countermeasures to prevent producing such gluten formation or to decrease the influence of the gluten formation.
Bakeries which mass-produce cannot avoid using additives.
Some bakers who try to produce products having quality as high as possible stop using a mixer at an early stage in which the water mixing is incomplete, remove dough from the mixer, and complete the water mixing by performing manual processing of the dough. Furthermore, some bakers seeking products having higher quality avoid even using a mixer as a method for effecting water mixing.
As for a process of effecting water mixing, there is also a method in which powder material and liquid material are alternatively fed into a container or a pouch, and are left for many hours so as not to cause formation of gluten which will lower quality; and the completion of the water mixing in which the liquid material naturally disperses within the powder material is put on hold.
In this case, since many hours are required for completing the water mixing, it is maintained at a low temperature by putting it into a refrigerator in order to suppress an abnormal fermentation of yeast.
(2) Making Dough for Making Noodles
Conventional mixers for making noodles are also mixers which, whether of a batch type having low speed or a continuous type having semi-high speed, make non-uniformity in the water mixing appearing at first uniform by way of a blending-and-mixing operation.
A ratio of water to be added (equal to a ratio between the weight of wheat flour and the weight of liquid material to be added to this wheat flour) of dough for making noodles is normally equal to or less than 10% to 30% lower than that for dough for making bread itself being 30% to 50%. Thus, it is still more difficult to disperse and immerse the water within the wheat flour. Conventional mixers for making dough for making noodles cannot make non-uniformity in water mixing appearing at the beginning of adding of liquid material uniform at the time when mixing process is ended, or even at a time after performing of additional processing for increasing the uniformity of the water distribution, even in the case of using a low speed and batch type mixer or even in the case of using a semi-high speed and continuous type mixer.
However, during the mixing process or the additional process for increasing the uniformity of water distribution, by removing air within the wheat flour by vacuuming air within the wheat flour or by compressing the wheat flour, uniformity can be achieved. However, as to be mentioned later, foods in which air is removed by vacuuming the air or by compression will lose their taste and aroma. Therefore, this is not preferable for a method for making foods.
If the mixing time is made longer so as to achieve uniformity using only the mixer, the gluten formation previously formed therein will be destroyed by an applied force of blending and mixing; as a result, dough having almost no gluten formation therein, which is completely useless. This is because the amount of destroyed gluten formation which was previously formed is larger than that of gluten formation which is newly produced by continuing the mixing process.
Therefore, when making noodles using a machine, even when material which has been put into a semi-high speed and continuous type mixer is made to pass through the mixer within only 10 seconds, in order to obtain dough which is useable for making noodles, it still needs additional processing after the mixing processing, such as kneader processing which further increases uniformity by way of slow blending and mixing, leaving-and-maturation processing in which one waits for the further uniformity of water contained therein to increase after forming the dough into a belt-shape and leaving it, or the like. Such processing requires time of at least 30 minutes to 60 minutes.
When making noodles using a manual processing for making teuchi udon, tenobe men, or the like, it is removed from a mixer and is thereafter processed so as to increase the uniformity of the water-dispersion by processes such as foot-stepping processing, leaving-and-maturation processing, and the like. However, even when these processes are performed, a complete mixing state still cannot be obtained at the time immediately after the processing.
When making noodles using manual processing which uses a high water adding ratio close to 50%, water within portions where water was added excessively in the initial stage forms small pockets of free water; and the free water remains within the dough or within the noodles while forming small pieces until the last. Therefore, the dough or the noodles will have high adhesiveness. Accordingly, during the process of making noodles, making noodles had to be made while preventing the adhesiveness by painting oil or adding powder onto the dough or the noodles.
(3) Semi-High Speed-Type Mixer
A continuous type-semi-high speed blending-and-mixing mixer for making noodles (SUPER TURBO TURBULISOR, or the improved mixers thereof) is a mixer developed for the purpose of chopping portions which are mixed with excessive water (in many cases, salt water) using wings or paddles rotating at semi-high speed, at an inner wall surface of an outer cylinder; and mixing it with powder portions which were not mixed with water, and thereby performing uniform mixing within a short time. There are other mixers in which powder material and liquid material are fed from a side end of an outer cylinder; however, the way of performing uniform mixing is the same.
However, the same as the principles of a centrifugal separator, material mixed with water and therefore having higher weight will rotate along an inner wall of the outer cylinder, while powder material which was not mixed with water and therefore having lower weight will rotate at an inner side thereof. Therefore, expected contact between mixed portions and non-mixed portions does not occur, and thus, uniformity is not increased.
Accordingly, with this kind of mixer, products removed from the mixer will enter a clumpy state in which a material having a lower mixing ratio with water surrounds a material having a higher mixing ratio with water. Therefore, even though time for passing through the mixer is short, an additional process for increasing uniformity is required in order to make noodles.
There is a continuous type mixer for making noodles (FLOW JETTER) which has a horizontal disc rotating at a semi-high speed under 2,500 rounds per second onto which wheat flour and water are fed in order to spread them in every direction so as to make them fine particles and mix them. Theoretically, this mixer should be able to perform more uniform mixing of powder material and liquid material than the above-mentioned mixer.
However, in actuality, the powder material is provided unevenly towards the vicinity of a center of the disc; therefore, much unevenness occurs depending on the scattering direction of the powder material. In addition, since a part of the powder material cannot be mixed with water and scatters, there are many cases in which a dust chamber is necessary. The removed product enters a clumpy state in which portions mixed with excessive water are surrounded by portions having low-water mixing ratio. Of course, this cannot be used for making noodles without performing additional processing.
(4) Vacuum Mixer
There is a mixer called a vacuum mixer which performs blending and mixing by decompression. Since it has a function of performing blending and mixing while removing air within powder material, which prevents dispersion of liquid material, uniformity can be achieved within a comparatively short time. However, of course, air within the dough is lost. As a result, noodles having low air content are made. Therefore, as with pasta or noodles made by putting it into a cylinder, compressing it using a piston, and extruding it from a die while removing air, noodles made by the mixer will become noodles in which taste and smell of the material are poorly experienced regardless of the quality of the material.
This is because the human taste bud feels the taste when air and taste-constituent contained in foods intermittently stimulate the taste bud.
Accordingly, it must be said that making dough using this kind of mixer and making noodles by applying high-pressure cause problems when used as methods for making foods for which taste and flavor are important.
Furthermore, since air is removed, it becomes hard; thereby causing the speed of water immersion into pasta or noodles to become slow. The water is indispensable for alpha-forming when boiling them. Therefore, there is another problem in that time for boiling becomes longer.